Re: DRM at the network layer?

[Eric Rescorla <ekr@rtfm.com>]

Steve Bellovin <smb@research.att.com> writes:

> Today's New York Times had an article on the so-called "broadcast 
> flag", an indicator in over-the-air HDTV broadcasts designed to prevent 
> copying or uploading of such broadcasts.  One sentence in the article 
> is very IETF-relevant:
> 
> 	An F.C.C. official said, for instance, that the broadcast
> 	flag could contain software code that was recognized by
> 	computer routers in a way that the program would self-destruct
> 	after passing through three routers while being e-mailed
> 	by a user.
> 
> I asked Mike Godwin, a technically-savvy lawyer who's been fighting
> this issue, if they were referring to IP routers.  His response was
> "I believe that is what they are talking about, and I believe one's 
> mind should indeed boggle."

Seth Schoen appears to have solved the mystery of what's going on
here. http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/archives/000465.html#comments
It's stupid, but not as stupid as it initially sounds. Just garden
variety stupid.

---
This is probably supposed to be a reference to the
decision by the DTLA to allow DTCP over IP. One
of the things that DTLA licensees are supposed to
do when sending DTCP over IP is to set the IP TTL
to 3, in the name of preventing DTCP data from
being sent more than 3 hops over the Internet.
(Obviously, this is very easy to get around using
VPNs and the like.)


Presumably the connection between this and the
broadcast flag got garbled somewhere along the
chain. If the FCC adopts a rule permitting ATSC
receivers to output to DTCP, the manufacturers
can, under the DTLA license, then output these
broadcasts over TCP/IP networks provided they set the
TTL to 3. That doesn't mean that the broadcast
flag itself is doing this (it's government
regulation, not the flag!) or that the messages
are really "self-destructing" (they're just
expiring using the normal IP TTL decrement
mechanism).
---


-Ekr





-- 
[Eric Rescorla                                   ekr@rtfm.com]
                http://www.rtfm.com/